


rabid bits of time

by fairyuphoria



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Female pronouns for Pidge, M/M, Other, Time Travel, aleks has been through some shit and shes only sixteen, ill add more tags as this goes on, just a few aliens that are good at biogenetics, keith and lance have a kid, klance lovechild, no mpreg stuff or a/b/o stuff, slight mentions of character death/injury in the future, this is kinda sad and angsty
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-10-24
Updated: 2017-05-11
Packaged: 2018-08-24 13:00:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 17,069
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8373139
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fairyuphoria/pseuds/fairyuphoria
Summary: When a wormhole spits out a beaten spacecraft, no one imagines the chaos that comes with the bloodied teenage pilot that pull out from it. Much less do they expect her to say her name is Aleks Kogane McClain.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Summary is short but like... that's rlly kinda what it is for right now.  
> The beginning of this story is kinda robotic i feel like, but it gets better as it gets going  
> This is unedited so pls bare with my mistakes (-:
> 
> Enjoy!

“What is that?” Pidge gasps, leaning against the observation deck window, gazing out into space as the swirling wormhole begins to get larger. She’d learned from experience that wormholes were no joke and also no fun, although it didn’t look like this one was nearly as big as the ones she had contact with-- which she hoped was a good thing.

 

“It’s a wormhole,” Lance says, leaning in next to Pidge. 

 

“Obviously, dumbass, she meant what is causing it,” Keith shoots back, earning a glare from Lance before both directing their attention to the wormhole as it flexed and pulses. 

 

“It’s not big enough for a Galra craft, so we shouldn’t have to worry about that, but it may still be potentially dangerous,” Allura informs. After a few moments of observing the wormhole, it rippled, causing a small spacecraft to be spat out into space, the wormhole proceeding to zip close behind it and disappear as if it was never there. The spacecraft was more of what looked like an escape pod, extremely small, probably big enough to fit one person and no more, although the worrisome part about it was, even from a distance, it seemed to be badly damaged. 

 

“Should we go rescue it?” Shiro asked Allura with a raised eyebrow. 

 

Allura shook her head slightly. “That won’t be necessary, the castle has a bay for spacecraft rescue, to get them out using your lions would be much too complicated, it will only take a few moments, but I’d like you to be prepared with weapons in case of the inhabitant being threatening.”

 

With a nod the paladins scatter to retrieve their bayards and met back in the bay previously mentioned, hovering around the beaten craft, long claw marks decorated its sides and not one space was undented. Shiro and Hunk managed to heave open the door after Pidge having melded it off with some space equivalent of a blowtorch. 

 

“Shit,” Hunk whispered, looking inside, eyes going wide, before being nudged by Shiro to work quickly in getting the pilot out. 

 

Everyone freezes when Shiro and Hunk manage to pull out the small  _ human _ girl from the craft, covered in blood and grime. “Is that a human?”

 

“It looks like it,” Coran raises an eyebrow, curiously leaning forward to view the girl, taking one of her wrists to check her pulse. It was ever so faint but still there. “She’s still alive, but we should probably get her to a healing pod and quickly.” 

 

Shiro followed Coran hurriedly, the girl’s long, presumably once chestnut, hair dangled and swayed as he walked. Once loading her into a healing pod the rest of the paladins stood back to watch Coran do a scan on her. “She’s definitely human. How she got all the way out here is a mystery, but she should be out of the healing pod by tomorrow, so we can ask her then.”

The hours ticked by extremely slow the next day as the paladins waited for their rescue to wake up. “I just don’t get it, how could a human be out here in space?” Shiro shook his head, leaning against the coach. 

 

“Did you guys notice that the pod she was in looked like ours?” Hunk brings up, eyebrows scrunched together, clearly lost in his own thoughts. 

 

“I mean, it was so badly beaten, I didn’t really notice, but now that you mention it, kinda of…,” Pidge replies, seeming more confused then she had been moments ago. 

 

“It’s more of a matter of where that wormhole began, isn’t it?” Keith adds, earning a hum from the rest of the paladins. 

 

Lance let out a loud groan, throwing himself up to stand. “I don’t know about you guys but sitting around here is driving me crazy, I think I’m going to go down to the training deck, it’ll keep my mind occupied, ya know?”

 

Keith quirked an eyebrow in interest at the mention of the training. “Wanna spar me, McLaine?”

 

Lance turned from where he’d began his exit from the living quarters to raise an eyebrow. “You wanna lose, Kogane?” 

 

Keith smirks as he stood up and began to follow Lance out of the room. “In your dreams.”

 

Pidge rolled her eyes and shook her head watching the two disappear. “I swear to god, when are they just gonna make out already?”

 

“That’s the true question of the universe, isn’t it?” Hunk muses in return. 

 

\----

 

“Paladins, our guest is about to wake from their cryopod, please report to the healing bay,” Allura’s voice broadcasts throughout the castle, earning a whoop from Hunk who was near ready to die of boredom. 

 

“Please be aware that she will most likely be very disoriented when she first emerges, don’t beraid her with questions until we’re sure she’s okay,” Allura instructs before glancing around. “Where are Lance and Keith?”

 

“Last I knew they were on the training deck, although they’re probably on their way up now, we were just closer so that’s why we got her sooner,” Shiro explained making Allura nod, seeming pleased enough with the answer. 

 

“Very well, it should be okay with you three here,” Allura shrugs as she begins to tap away on the screen for a few moments. With a gust of cold air the once injured girl, still covered in remnants of blood and dirt stumbled forward, eyes fluttering open, leaning against one of the edges of the cryopod entrance. After a few more bleary blinks, girl looks up in confusion, eyes focusing in and out before widening. She began to scramble away from the group in front of her, looking around wildly before her eyes land on what could possibly be a weapon-- a glass from the kitchen full of water, or the space equivalent, for when she woke up. She snatches the glass, quickly spilling it’s contents and hitting the rim to send pieces flying everywhere, leaving the glass jagged and an impressive makeshift weapon.

 

“Where am I?!” She growled out, holding the glass in front of her, darting her grey eyes between the five people staring back at her in surprise. Shiro begins to inch forward, arms extended outwards wearily before she barks back, “Stay away from me, you come any closer and I’ll kill you.”

 

The threaten sends a shiver down all of their spines, because she definitely seemed like she meant it. Who would’ve thought this 5’3” teenager that had just fallen out of a cryopod could be so damn scary. Shiro nods back at her request. “You’re in the Castle of Lions, we found your ship after you came out of a wormhole. You and your ship were both badly injured so we took you here to heal, we mean no harm.”

 

Her eyes go wide, looking around the room she had previously dismissed, being met with familiar white and grey. Quickly, she began to shake her head, still wielding the broken glass. “No, that-that doesn’t make sense, I just came from the Castle of Lions, my name is Aleks, I’m the paladin of the red lion of Voltron.”

 

Everyone stills, looking to Allura or Coran for any answers but only being met with their slightly shocked faces as well. “What do you mean you’re the red paladin, we already have a red paladin,” Pidge asks, cocking an eyebrow at the girl, getting a weird feeling from her, only to be met with an icy grey stare.

 

“I mean exactly what I’m saying,” She gritted out. “I’m the red paladin of Voltron.” In her daze she failed to notice the other inhabitants of the room other than Shiro, eyes finally falling on the Princess and Coran. “Allura! Coran! You have to remember me.”

 

They look to each other and then to the girl in surprise. “I’m sorry but… we aren’t aware of who you are. I’ve never met an Aleks, much less one as a paladin of Voltron.”

 

The girl let out a small groan, pulling on hand through her long brown locks in frustration, being to mumble incoherently under her breath, causing the other paladins to look on in slight concern; maybe she was just crazy. She intakes a sharp breath, looking up in realization. “What year is it?”

 

“Approximately 2219,” Coran informs her. 

“Fuck,” She hisses. “I haven’t been born yet. The wormhole must have time jumped and I’ve ended up here, if this is 2219,” She looks up through her mumbled madness, eyeing the other paladins carefully before breathing out a breath of disbelief. 

 

“Pidge, Hunk, Shiro, is that you?” She manages to get out. “I should’ve recognized you guys, I don’t know why I didn’t sooner, holy shit, you all look different.”

 

The paladins being addressed stare in slight confusion and weary shock. “You… know us?”

 

“Know you?” She chuckles slightly. “You guys are my aunt and uncles.”

 

“What?” Hunk chokes out. 

 

Aleks shakes her head, letting out a sigh. “For paladins of Voltron you guys aren’t that observant are you? My full name is Aleks Kogane McLaine.”

 

The air in the healing bay is tense for only a moment, broken quickly by the woosh of the sliding door and familiar bickering. Speak of the devils. 

 

“Well we wouldn’t be late if you hadn’t been an idiot with that last shot,” Keith shoots a glare at Lance as they rush into the room. 

 

“Oh yeah, it’s all my fault Mr.Just-One-More-Bot,” Lance rolled his eyes. “Bite me, Keith.”

 

They stop in surprise once seeing the excessive pairs of eyes all glued to them. Aleks swears she’s not breathing anymore because there they are. Her parents, who she’d last seen fighting with her in battle, who she wasn’t sure were alive anymore, who looked so much younger, so unscarred, so naive. She wanted to cry, there was a painful knot in her throat and her hands were shaking with the need to be held by her fathers like they’d done so many times to her in the past when she had bad days or nightmares. But this was one nightmare she couldn’t seem to wake up from. This was reality, she was stuck in a time before she was even born, before her fathers were most likely even together, before the thought of a child joining the Castle of Lions was even a possibility. That’s what she was still, she was still a child, fighting a war, she was still a child who missed her parents and her family back in another time, she was still only a kid. 

 

“Aleks, are you okay?” Shiro asks softly, breaking the silence, seeing the once anger and frustration she had worn before Keith and Lance had enter melted off her face and into something akin to sadness and innocence. Shiro could see it, she was only a kid, probably younger than  even Pidge, yet here she was, miles away from her home, in another time, or possibly alternate universe to her own. 

 

Aleks weakly lowered her pathetically made glass weapon, hands still shaking, looking up to Shiro. She had to be strong, she had to be, she was a paladin, paladins don’t cry about stupid things like parents and being trapped on the other side of a time travelling wormhole. But at the same time, she was scared. “I wanna go home,  _ samchon _ ,” She whispered. 

 

Keith quirked an eyebrow in surprise and interest at the use of Korean, but mostly to her addressing Shiro as her uncle. He’d never seen this girl in his life, there was no possible way that Shiro had a niece, and to his own knowledge, the closest thing to a brother Shiro had was himself. 

 

“We’ll get you home, but first you have to explain to us what… what you said before,” Shiro begins, kneeling beside the girl who was now sitting on the floor, the adrenalin fueled strength she once had now depleting, leaving her on shaky legs. Aleks looked up, glancing from her fathers and back to Shiro. 

 

“Are you sure that’s a good idea? I might freak you guys out, most specifically them, besides what about the Butterfly Effect or whatever, isn’t this against every rule of time travel?” She let out a weak laugh. 

 

“Time travel?” Lance questions, looking at the girl who stared back at him with eyes full of sadness and longing. 

 

Shiro sighed, looking to Allura for her opinion, getting a sigh of her own out before addressing his questioning look. “It’s not like we can figure out what’s going on here without telling them as well, we will deal with the consequences if they arise, but if we’re able to get you back to your time, we should be okay.”

 

Aleks looked to Allura, standing tall and beautiful like she did in the time she’d known her, although it was odd to see her with long hair since she’d cut it into a more practical shoulder length when she had been around the age of four-- she looked good with both. With a sigh Aleks nodded and began, “This is probably gonna freak you guys out because, well, I haven’t been born yet so like, obviously, anyways, I’m the red paladin of Voltron in the year 2238, I’m sixteen, and my name is Aleks Kogane McClaine.”

 

A silence blankets over the room, all eyes turning to Keith and Lance to gauge their reactions, both faces of shock and disbelief. “Wait, what… what do you mean your last name is Kogane McClaine?”

 

“I’m your daughter,” Aleks responded, voice sharp as their gaze at the two and Lance sees it, he seems the familiar grey that manages to constantly look like it’s shifting between a storm and the lightest shade of powdered violet he’d ever seen, he’s seen the same intense stare on Keith. When one of her pale hands runs through the familiar curling chestnut locks, he seems himself too, he sees it in the shape of her eyes and the curve of her mouth, he’d seen it on himself in countless rehearsed speeches and pickup-lines in front of the mirror. She looked like someone had taken himself and Keith, put them into a blender and poured out an Aleks smoothie, looking like the spitting image of the both of them at the same time. Although, if that was true, it left so many questions in the air. It’s not like Keith or Lance were dating, nor did they even see each other in that light, they’d barely gotten into the friendship part of their relationship, still that being said, they were both males to Lance’s knowledge, it was physically impossible for them to have a kid that looked so much like the both of them. 

 

“How?” Keith manages to speak. 

 

“The year 2222, lucky huh, you saved a planet from the Galra, who just so happened to be extremely advanced in biogenetics, saw, as Pa-” Aleks cuts herself off quickly, darting her eyes to Lance for only a moment before clearing her throat to continue. “As Lance told me, they’d said they’d never seen two souls who mingled so well together and were so… in love, so they gifted you guys a child, perfectly spliced from the two of you, and voila, here I am.” 

 

The story felt extremely odd to hear, like some sort of childhood fairytale because there was no way Lance or Keith could imagine being incredibly in love with the other, much less raising a child together. That sounded like a nightmare, yet here was a girl, who’d come from a wormhole, knowing all of them, claiming to be a paladin of voltron, and looked scarily like the blue and red paladin mixed together. 

 

“What happened that made you have to take a wormhole in one of the castle pods?” Allura questions, clearly having noticed how similar her pod had looked to the ones they currently had. 

 

Aleks leaned her head on the wall, eyes closed, after a moment she began to speak in a strained voice, “When I was fourteen I was captured by the Galra,” That was no good way to start any sentence, especially from someone so young. Shiro and Lance flinched at the thoughts running through their head of this girl in Galra hands. “I was captive for 2 months, give or take, but I managed to escape with only a few cuts and bruises and well… and this,” She yanks down the collar of her tattered black shirt, showing the almost pyramid like purple metal sticking from over where her heart was. “I was supposed to be their most industrial weapon, the next Champion and something to beat Voltron for good. I was the perfect subject, the daughter of the blue and red paladin, what better, right? But obviously I said fuck that and I-I killed Haggar when I escaped and finally made it back home.

 

“You should’ve seen all of your faces when I came back on my own,” She chuckled lightly. “But we were fine for another year and a half, until… until I had to pilot the Red Lion, it was all fine, just difficult with circumstances, but Voltron was more important, more needed than the feelings of teenage girl, ya know? Then yesterday, or it feels like yesterday I don’t know how much time has actually gone by, but we were attacked, they weren’t gonna let a modified teenage girl who killed their best druid get away, apparently. The two years we spent recouping and doing Voltron things, they were preparing for this attack. We were outnumbered and you had a rookie piloting Red, I-I don’t remember much of what happened, I just remember- I-,” She bites her lip, shaking her head. The memories were raw, they had only happened a mere few hours ago for her, the blood, the screaming, the fire, the Galra tech pulsing in her chest urging her to kill, to do what she was programmed for. She could feel her father’s hands pushing her into a pod as she screamed, begging him not to do it, she didn’t want to be alone, he just stared back with tearful eyes, told her he loved her, and sent her into safety the only way he knew how. Where they even still alive? Statistically her brain told her no, she had barely survived by escaping, and they had stayed in the burning castle to fight. She was well aware they’d all go down with Voltron if need be, it made her heartache. Her whole family, everything she knew, was probably dead, and yet here she was, programmed for the Galra, and still living; how selfish. 

 

“Aleks, you don’t have to continue if you don’t want to,” Allura mumbles and her voice sounds just like milk and honey, just like she was used to and with her eyes closed she's almost able to trick herself into thinking she’s back home. That it’s one of the nights that she just needed to talk and be heard and Allura was speak back, sometimes advice, and sometimes just talking of her own, they’d fall asleep on Allura’s extremely soft bed to the lulls of each other's voices but feel a million times lighter. She misses it, she misses everything and it’s not even been a full hour since she’d lost it all. 

 

Aleks lets out a loud breath, finally blinking her eyes open to view the worried eyes trained on her. “I just miss home already,” She let’s out a slightly wet laugh, running the back of her hand across her eyes. “This is lame, I didn’t want to cry. I place full blame on you… Lance, for passing along the homesickness gene.”

 

Lance’s eyes go slightly wide at the comment, at her knowledge of her ever present homesickness, making this situation all the more real. Looking at the girl teary eyed, beaten, and mentally scarred, his heart ached, knowing exactly the feeling of the homesickness she felt, but no where near the pain of everything else she’d come through at such a young age. She didn’t deserve it. Lance took a tentative step forward before crouching in front of her, gaining her attention, glossy eyes staring at him in awe. 

 

“Hey,” He begins softly, hovering his hand over her arm before lightly placing it onto the paler skin. “We’re going to get you home, I promise okay?”

  
Aleks’ lip began to quiver staring back at the younger version of her father reassuring her like he had when she was back home, making her shakily nod her head and let out a broken sob, collapsing into his chest. Lance sits in slight shock for a moment before wrapping his arms around her, realizing just how small she was. She was only a kid. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Aleks has a nightmare and they come up with an idea of looking into Aleks' memories... it may have been a mistake...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So sorry for the long wait, life has been wild lately, school has been super busy and I'm signing up for college classes for next semester, so I'll be taking college while also still being in high school so next year I may not post as much, if this story still isn't finished, we'll see though!  
>  I hope you enjoy this chapter, it's super fucking long lol.  
> As always, there are many many mistakes (-:

 

“This is so fucking weird,” Lance exclaimed, sitting at the dining room table after Allura had taken Aleks to the showers. 

 

“Lance,” Allura begins as he runs a hand roughly through his hair.

 

“I have a fucking daughter- and with Keith!” Lance squawks. 

 

Meanwhile Keith sits blankly, trying to sort through the thoughts within his head. The idea that he was going to be a father in the future was something that had never previously crossed his mind, he never saw settling down in his future. Honestly, he didn’t see much of a future for himself at all, trying to look forward, he can’t see anything past where he is now. Yet, some version of himself had raised a child into a teenager, had had the future he’d never dared to imagine, and with Lance, out of everyone. Keith’s grey eyes dart over slightly to look at Lance ramble in a panic, tugging at his brown hair with tanned hands, worn and calloused from their short time piloting Voltron and maybe something before. He was attractive, he’d give him that, but he rarely found anything he did as endearing, his personality was loud and always out there that it almost made Keith’s ears hurt thinking about it. To imagine Lance as his partner was… something.

 

A soft knock from the metal doorway sounded through Lance mumbling slightly insanely under his breath. Everyone looked up in slightly surprise, finding Aleks timidly tipped into the dining room, long familiar brown hair wet and sticking to her skin now clean of the blood and dirt it had before. “I uh, I can come back later if you guys need to discuss things, I-”

 

“No, no, come sit now, you must be hungry,” Shiro speaks up, waving her in, earning a timid smile, fully stepping into the room to make her way to the seat beside Shiro. Without all the grime covering her body you could clearly see the puffy pink scars extremely similar to Shiro’s littering her arms and disappearing under her shirt. Everyone’s eyes widen slightly seeing the numerous lengths of skin that had once been torn up by the Galra most likely. Once seat she curiously looked around the table, raising one eyebrow back at their obvious faces.

 

“How’d you get those scars?” Shiro mumbled, eyes flitting from one raised piece of skin to another. 

 

She quickly tucked her arms under the table, furrowing her eyebrows together. “How’d you get yours?” She shot back making Shiro open and close his mouth before nodding. “I-sorry, they’re just embarrassing… always a reminder you know.”

 

Her hand ran up and down one of the scars on her bicep before looking up to see Coran place a bowl of goo in front of her, eyes lighting up, tilting her head up to the mustached man to beam at him. “Thanks Coran! Looks delicious.”

 

Coran stared at her in surprise, he’d never heard that before when directed at his cooking. Though it made sense, having never experienced the taste of an American cheeseburger or spaghetti or Hunk’s Taco Tuesday, she knew nothing else but the goo. 

 

“So…” Pidge trails out, looking at the girl as she ate. “What’s the future like?”

 

Aleks looks up curiously at Pidge, swallowing the bite of goo she’d taken before tilting her head to think. “Would’ve thought you of all people would want to be a little more careful with the whole time travel deal,” Aleks mused. “You sure it’ll be okay if I talk about it? I won’t give a ton away but still, space time continuum could be all messed up if I fuck with it.”

 

Her eyes widen slightly when the swear slips from her mouth, glancing to Lance and Keith out of habit only to find them staring back at her in reverence. She let out a small breath, remember just where she was, this was going to take some time to get used to. Allura hums, tapping a finger on the table in thought. “I think I’ll erase our memories of this after we are able to get you back home for the sake of 

yourself and for the universe. So you should be free to talk about it all for now.”

 

Aleks nodded slightly, ignoring the feeling of emptiness hearing that they would all forget this soon. “The future is… well it’s kind of the same, not much has changed. The castle looks the same, obviously there is still a war going on, I honestly don’t know who’s winning anymore. Although, all of your hair has changed for the most part,” Aleks looks up with a small smile. “Shiro, Coran, and Hunk all have the same hair, which is fine because they rock it, but Pidge, you grew yours out, it’s past your shoulders now. Allura cut her hair into a cute little bob, it looks really nice. Lance shaved his sides, has got an undercut now, looks pretty sharp if you ask me. And Keith, rest in peace the mullet, he finally chopped it, and not saying I got the space equivalent of gum stuck in it so he had to, but…”

 

“Fucking finally!” Lance exclaims. “If I had only know all it took was gum.”

 

“Don’t you dare,” Keith glares sharply at Lance who was grinning suspiciously at him. 

 

\------ 

 

It was nearly midnight when the high pitched scream rung throughout the hallway that held everyone rooms, echoing off of the metal and managing to wake everyone who had already fallen asleep. Hastily everyone rushed out of their individual rooms and found Allura kneeling beside Aleks in the room they had given her, whispering and rubbing her arms while she cried. 

 

“What happened?” Shiro huffed, looking at Allura and Aleks. 

 

“She had a nightmare, I still don’t think she realizes she’s not in the dream anymore,” Allura bites her lip looking to the smaller girl in a ball, hands over her ears. 

 

Shiro moves to crouch down besides Allura reaching out a hand, but Aleks instantly flinched away, letting out another yelp. “Don’t touch me, don’t touch me, don’t touch me! I’m not one of you!”

 

Everyone frowns as another choked sob exits her mouth, Shiro flinches back as well, extracting his hand. He can only imagine the nightmares she was having based on his own, but she was only a kid, she shouldn’t have to experience anything he had to. Hesitantly, Keith began to come forward. “Aleks, you’re were dreaming, it’s okay now.”

 

Instantly her eyes snap open in surprise, blurrily darting around the room to find the owner of the voice through her tears. Finally the two pairs of grey eyes meet each other, one filled with tears. “D-Dad?”

 

Keith freezes for a moment, eyes widening ever so slightly before nodding. “Yeah it’s okay, you’re safe.”

 

With one more loud sob, she shoots forward to wrap her arms around Keith, burying her head into his shoulder, soft sobs still shaking her body, tears leaking onto Keith’s pajama shirt. “Where is papa? Is he safe?”

 

Keith looks over to Lance who is stood there in alarm until Hunk quickly pushes him forward, simultaneously seeming to knock him out of whatever trance he was in, stumbling to kneel beside Keith. “I-I’m right here,” Lance whispers, placing a hand on her shaking arm, feeling one of the many scars press into his palm. 

 

Her eyes crack open to meet his own, slick with tears, glossy and sparkling from the light of the hallway behind him. She tentatively reaches her hand out, placing it on his cheek. “You’re real.”

 

Lance is still for a moment before nodding. She smiles slightly, her sobs having been exchanged for small shudders and the aftershock of her panic, leaving only slightly damp reddened cheeks and shaky breathes in it’s wake. “They had you again, at least Haggar made it seem like she did, made me kill you. I hate that dream, it’s one of the worst ones,” She slowly mumbles, eyes drooping and head sinking further down into Keith’s collarbone. “Promise I won’t kill you, Papa. I never will.”

 

And then her breathing slows and the hand that was curled into Keith’s shirt slowly loosens and drops, leaving Lance to stare back at the sleeping face of her future daughter, who’d experienced more pain then he could even begin to fathom. “She’s asleep,” Keith whispers, looking up to Allura and Shiro who stare back down at him with faces of mild surprise and pride. “Should we just leave her here again? She might have another nightmare.”

 

“I’ll take her back to my room, if she has another nightmare though I might have to come get you two again,” Allura informs, picking Aleks out of Keith’s arms easily, tucking her head into her own chest. 

 

Keith and Lance both nod as she makes her way out of the room Aleks had been inhabiting and taking a right down the hall towards her own room. 

\--------

 

Aleks came into breakfast with Allura, letting out a loud laugh, Allura smiling back at her before they both found their seats at the table. 

 

“How are you feeling, Aleks?” Shiro asks, turning to raise an eyebrow at the younger girl.

 

She shrugs. “I’m fine, used to it I guess, I uh, I’m sorry about last night, for you two specifically,” Aleks looks up to Lance and Keith. “Thanks though, I really appreciate what you did. But I’m fine now, so it’s whatever.”

 

“It’s no problem,” Lance shrugs, Keith nods along. 

 

“Actually Aleks,” Allura begins, twirling the spoon in her hand absentmindedly. “I had an idea last night, it’s kind of… risky, but it could help us find a way to get you back home, but you’re absolutely able to say no to this.”

 

Aleks raises a suspicious eyebrow at the white haired girl. “Well, what is it?”

 

“We have headsets that we usually use for bonding exercises between paladins, I’m not sure if you still use them in your time, but they also double as being able to extract information from enemies harmlessly rather than torture or other inhumane methods other species have. Since you’re unable to remember most of your last moments in your time, we might be able to use your memories to find out the cause of the wormhole going this far back,” Allura explains, waving her hands as she explains. 

 

“But?” Aleks asks, clearly catching on to the unease in Allura’s voice. 

 

Allura lets out a sigh. “But, we’d have to go through all of your memories, it’s almost like fast forwarding through a movie, we can’t pinpoint a specific memory or time, we have to flip through them until we find the right one.”

 

Aleks takes her bottom lip between her teeth in thought. Every happy memory of her childhood coming to mind but also all of the moments in Galra custody tagged along with them, everything that she didn’t want them to see. Yet at the same time she just wanted to get home, she wanted to create more memories with her family instead of only reminiscing on the ones she had made and being stuck here. If this helped her get home, then she would do anything. Letting out a small sigh. “Fine, I’ll do it, just because I want to get home. I’m warning you all now, there will be some things that you might not want to see, so this is kinda viewer discretion warning I guess,” She lets out a small chuckle, running a stray hand through the long brown locks. 

\--------

 

“You ready, Aleks,” Shiro raised an eyebrow at the girl laying on the small cot, wires attached all around her temples. 

 

She lets out a stiff chuckle. “As ready as I’ll ever be.”

 

“Are you one hundred percent sure you want to do this?” Lance’s worried voice makes Aleks open her once closed eyes. “Once your in, you can’t get out.”

 

“Stop worrying,” Aleks dismissed him. “Besides, if this helps me get back home, I’d do it a million times.”

 

“Alright, Aleks, relax yourself, we’re about to put you under, then we’re starting the scanner. In three, two-,” Coran’s voice fades out in a milky smoothness, darkness surrounding Aleks for a moment before a ripple of a memory comes into view, project itself onto the screen in front of all of the rest of Voltron. 

 

_ “Papa! Papa! Look!” The small voice, easily assumed to be Aleks called out. Quickly the man standing tall in front of her turned around, revealing the tanned familiar skin of Lance and Keith standing in front of him, dark hair pulled back. Lance smiled back at the smaller girl.  _

 

_ “What is it mi hija?” Lance responds, kneeling in front of the smaller figure, the love in his smile almost sickeningly sweet.  _

 

_ “Look! I’m daddy!” She exclaims, movement is heard and the view of the memory wobbles slightly before Lance lets out a loud laugh, throwing his head back. Keith, standing in the back of the memory previously, begins to stride forward with a small smirk on his face.  _

 

_ “Oh you think that’s funny, huh? You little munchkin,” Keith teases, scooping up the younger Aleks behind the view of the memory, earning a small squeal before the memory fades away.  _

 

The paladins simply glance to Keith and Lance before the next memory is brought up. 

 

_ “Uncle Hunk!” The familiar young voice floats in, clearly aged slightly and the view of Hunk slightly taller than it would’ve been previously. Hunk turns from his place at the stove of the castle's kitchen, looking down at Aleks with a soft smile.  _

 

_ “Yeah Al?” Instantly a small groan comes from Aleks. _

 

_ “I told you not to call me Al anymore! It makes me sound like a balding man, I’ll start calling you Uncle Unk if you aren’t careful,” Aleks warned, hoisting herself up onto the counter. “But, what I wanted to ask is, how you make the weird goo taste so good! Like those weird yellow ball things we got from that planet yesterday!” _

 

_ Hunk blushed slightly at the comment, smiling at the girl. “Do you want me to teach you?” _

 

_ “Really?!” Aleks exclaims excitedly. “Yes! Yes! Yes!” _

 

_ Hunk lets out a hearty laugh and begins to explain a few basic cooking things before the memory quickly fades to a different one.  _

 

_ “Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday, dear Aleks! Happy birthday to you!” The whole of Voltron was gathered around the dining room table, a small cake sat in the middle of the table. Everyone looked different yet the same. Lance looked older stood besides Keith, one arm slung around his waist, hair cut into an undercut and the rest pulled into a tight bun on the crown of his head, briefly looking to Keith lovingly. Keith’s own hair, as Aleks had said, was cut short from his previous mullet, but he looked good, smiling back at Lance, pecking his lips quickly before turning his attention back to his daughter. Pidge and Hunk stood proudly together, singing possibly the loudest out of everyone, a large smile on each of their faces. Shiro’s smile stretched wide across his face, surprisingly not looking as aged as he probably should have, one hand sneakily intertwined with Allura’s, who stood happily singing, the shorter white locks swinging as she swayed along. Coran clapped along, singing incredibly out of pitch and earning a loud laugh from Aleks. After the singing ended, Aleks ducked forward, blowing out the makeshift candle. _

 

_ “Can’t believe our baby girl is already fourteen,” Lance shook his head, glancing to Keith who nodded in agreement. “It was just yesterday when you were toddling around in diapers and spitting up on Hunk.” _

 

_ “Papa,” Aleks whined.  _

 

_ “What he’s trying to say is,” Keith shook his head, still wearing a fond smile non-the-less. “We are incredibly proud of the young women you’re becoming, when we first had you I had never imagined I could become a father, much less to someone as incredible as you, and now here you are, stronger than most people I know, beyond smart, I don’t know who you get that from, it’s most definitely not myself or your father.” _

 

_ “Hey!” Lance squawks.  _

 

_ Keith lets out a small laugh. “Still, I’m so incredibly proud of you and who you’ve become. I can’t wait to see what you do next.” _

 

_ “Dad,” Aleks whispers, a wet sniffle following before she throws her arms around the two of her fathers.  _

 

_ “We love you,” Lance mumbles. “Happy birthday, Aleks.” _

 

The memory wafts away leaving the paladins feeling like they had experienced something they shouldn’t have, like they were intruding, which technically they were. 

 

_ “Aleks!” Quickly the memory changes to one with a very different feeling, red lights flashing and alarms blaring.  _

 

_ “Papa!” Aleks screams, reaching out a hand to the blue paladin who was being flanked by masses of Galra, only for Aleks to be harshly yanked backwards, a rough growl.  _

 

_ “If you stop struggling, they’ll live, we only want you,” The Galra soldier twisted her arm, yanking her to face him as he grumbled the conditions. Quickly her eyes dart over to where her father had been, the beams of blue having slowed.  _

 

_ “Lance!” A blur of red, obviously Keith, rushes into crowd of Galra, each one falling until it was only Lance laying in the middle pointing towards Aleks, making Keith whip his head around, eyes wide and full of pain. Aleks quickly looked back at the purple alien, jerkily nodding her head.  _

 

_ “Just leave them alone,” She gritted.  _

 

_ “Good girl,” He smirked before raising the butt of his gun to her forehead and then- black. The air is stiff around the paladins as they watch the harrowing memory fade into an even worse one.  _

 

_ “Ah, I’m proud of your retrieval, the girl is perfectly susceptible to everything we have planned, and the fact she’s daughter of the blue and red paladin means she has just enough Galran DNA to make her our perfect weapon,” It’s a woman's voice whispering in the darkness.  _

 

“Wait what?” Hunk quickly questions. “What does that mean?”

 

Keith stands there in shock, soaking in the information quickly before the memory continues, making everyone turn their attention back, the slow blinking showing a view of the room she was in making Shiro shiver. 

 

_ “The princess is up, just in time, lovely of you to join us,” The women coos, Aleks’ vision blurring in and out until finally focusing on the worn and wrinkled witch they recognized as Haggar. Aleks quickly looked around the room, seeing the copious amount of tools and screens pulled all around her, beginning to squirm. “Now stop that, struggling will only make this worse for you.” _

 

_ Aleks clenches her fists to stop herself from continuing to struggle, every inch of her body told her to escape, but how could she when she was strapped to a table, in a room with a druid and at least four Galra soldiers. “Before we start, we have a few questions to ask you, give us the answers and I ensure there will be less pain done upon you,” Haggar begins, picking up the long blade from the table of other torturous looking tools, making Aleks’ eyes widen significantly. “What is Voltron’s next move? How do we take over the lions without their paladins?” _

 

_ Haggar moves closer to rip off whatever had been over Aleks lips to keep her from talking or screaming. “Fuck you,” She instantly growled, spitting at Haggar who blinked back in surprise.  _

 

_ “Wrong answer,” She chuckled, whiping off her face before raising her blade wielding arm and the memory quickly faded away into another with purple alarms going off.  _

 

_ “Warning: prisoner  _ _ 226-9743 has escaped captivity, stop them at all cost, we want her dead or alive,” The Galran voice growled over the com of the hallways as Aleks pants heavily, glancing between hallways before dashing for one of the Galra escape pods, placing a bloody hand over the Galran hand print.  _

 

_ “And just where do you think you’re going?” Aleks hastily turns, blade drawn towards the Galra soldier who began to laugh as he approached. “You really think you can escape? Hell, why would you want to? Do you honestly think that if you ever managed to get out of this place that your family would take you back in, you’re one of us now!” _

 

_ “I’ll never be one of you!” She barked back.  _

 

_ “You’re Galran, you’re a monster,” He shakes his head at her. “Just say it.” _

 

_ “I’m human,” She dove forward quickly, pressing her blade onto the soldier's neck.  _

 

_ He lets out a disbelieving laugh. “You fight just like a Galra and your dearest Uncle, The Champion. You’re as human as your Galra father.” _

 

_ “Don’t you say a word about my dad,” She bared her teeth, seeing only a split second of fear in the soldier's eyes before she quickly moved the blade, sending purple blood splattering. “That was for Shiro.” _

 

_ “Aleks!” She quickly looked up to see the Galra rush through the door, placing a hand on the pad and successfully locking them in the escape pod quarters.  _

 

_ “Who are you?” She lept up, pointing the blade, freshly adorn with Galra blood, towards the man.  _

 

_ “Hurry, you don’t have much time, I can only hold them off for so much longer, you have to escape now, I’ll cloak you so they’re unable to track your ship but that’s all I’ll be able to do, you have to find your way home on your own,” He quickly instructed, beginning to quickly type into one of the computers attached to an escape pod.  _

 

_ “And why the hell should I trust you?” She snarled.  _

 

_ “Do you want to go home or not,” He began quickly turning to her. “Granddaughter.” _

 

_ Her eyes widen only slightly before he’s pushing her into the pod. “Wait what is your name?” _

 

_ “Unimportant, just please stay safe, Aleks, tell your father I’m sorry,” He gave her a sad smile before launching the pod into the dark and starry emptiness of space. She was free.  _

 

“What the actual fuck,” Lance quickly voices as the memory fades, looking over to Keith who stands in shock. “Are you a goddamn Galra?”

 

“I-I’m human,” He manages to stutter out. 

 

“Well I’m damn sure not a Galran and I know both of my parents, what about you, Mullet?” Lance quickly shot back making Keith’s eyes narrow into a sharp glare. 

 

“Both of you, quiet, we can discuss this after this is finished,” Shiro sharply ordered, quickly making them resort to silent and suspicious glares. 

 

_ “Paladins of Voltron, this is a distress signal, please, this is Aleks, I’m-I’m safe, but I need rescue from a Galran escape pod, please…,” Aleks voice is weak and quiet, hands shaking on the red button to record a distress signal. “I don’t know how much longer I’m going to last, but if you find this and I do die, please know that I love you all. Uncle Hunk, thank you for always giving the best hugs and for teaching me all of your secret recipes. Aunt Pidge, I owe you so much, for everything you’ve taught me and for just letting me cry on your shoulder when I was being an angsty teen. Shiro, I have so much respect for you, and holy shit you’re just so incredibly strong, mentally and physically, you always help me when I’m down and give the best advice, thank you. And Allura, I can’t thank you enough for our three am chats and for teaching me how to braid hair, you’re the sister I’ve never had. Coran, you without a doubt will always make me laugh, even when I in no way want to at all, and you’re like at least second on my list of good hugs. And Dad, I’m sorry for all of the fights we get into, I personally blame you for passing on the stubborn angsty gene, but no matter how long I grumble and ignore you, I will always love you, from one end of the ever extending universe to the other. Papa, thank you for showing me pacients, and I’m sorry as well for every time I made you doubt if you were able to take care of a Keith and a mini-Keith, but thank you for dealing with me and Dad. Te amo. If I don’t die this is going to be really awkward, but incase I do… I just had to say this all.” _

 

_ A wet sniffle is heard before Aleks raises her hand off the button and shakily slumps down against the pilot chair of the pod, vision blurring to black.  _

 

_ “Fuck, if she alive?” The panicked voice says through the foggy darkness.  _

 

_ “Her heart is still beating, she’ll live if we get her to a healing pod quick enough,” Shiro breaths, clearly taking in the scarred teenager, all the damage the Galra had put her through in such a short time they had her.  _

 

_ Aleks blinks slowly, showing three blurry faces hovering around her. “Dad?” _

 

_ “Holy shit, thank god, Aleks, baby girl, you’re going to be okay, everythings going to be okay, you’re safe now,” Keith frantically says, brushing stray bits of hair out of the younger girls faces.  _

 

_ Aleks lets out a choked laugh. “Don’t worry, I’m safe, calm down.” One shaky tanned hand brushes through Keith’s shorter locks making him let out a choked sob between a laugh, nodding.  _

 

_ The memories began to quickly flash by before setting quickly on a small memory. “Red? Red come in?” Aleks let out a small groan, pulling on her helmet again, ignoring the small pain pulsing in her forehead, she’d have a bruise there for sure.  _

 

_ “Red copying,” Aleks mumbles into her mic, seeing the faces flicker on the screen in front of her, everything's the same besides Keith’s armored body is surrounded by a black and purple glow and Shiro is nowhere to be found across the screen.  _

 

_ “Are you doing alright, Aleks?” Hunk asks, the crease in his eyebrow prominent. Aleks wants to snap, she really does, because she’s fucking fine, she can do this, she’s not weak, but this was also Hunk, and she’d never want to snap at him, he was too caring and had pure intentions. _

 

_ “I’m fine,” She gritted, but in all honestly her chest was beginning to hurt around whatever the Galra had inserted into her, it felt like Red was beginning to try to force her out of the lion, like a thorn, and this was bringing back all sorts of flashbacks of things she really really didn’t want to reexpreience.  _

 

_ “Aleks,” It’s a sharp tone and she knows who it belongs to, almost immediately everything feels clearer, looking up to see Shiro appear on the screen, stood besides Allura back on the Castle ship. His eyes are serious and slightly dark, “You’re here, remember that, stay focused on that, you’re no where else but here right now. Don’t push yourself, I know you can do this.” _

 

_ Aleks let out a slow shaky breath, eyes closed, before nodding. “Yeah, alright, thank you, Shiro.” _

 

_ “Of course, kiddo,” His smile is beyond soft but pained around the edges because he knows all too well the look in the young girl's eyes, he shouldn’t have to tell her things he tells himself when he’s having particularly bad flashbacks. She shouldn’t have to pilot a lion, if only he was stronger, she shouldn’t have to have that responsibility hanging over here after they’d only got her back a few months prior, her mind was still all sorts of jumbled and haunted. _

 

_ The memory flipped and melted into something else quiet at first, a small desk lamp illuminating a room. “The core is fragmented and connected by this red and yellow wire to the internal hardware, the GC-812 processor seems to be some kind of Galra equivalent. If we’re able to manipulate that axel on this part over here, we may be able to get this thing up and running,” Aleks voice listed before she looking up from the machinery to Pidge’s smiling face. “What’s that face for?” _

 

_ “Look at you, my little technician,” Pidge teased, ruffling Aleks’ hair slightly with a large smile making her laugh and groan. “It’s just cool seeing you have an interest in this and actually understand it, I barely taught you anything and you figured it out so fast. I tried to teach this to your dads one time and it went so far over their heads.” _

 

_ Aleks laughed shaking her own head slightly at the thought of her dads staring at bits and pieces of tech and just shrugging helplessly. “Do you remember when you were like eight and we couldn’t find you all day and then we found you hiding under the dining room table with a robot you built yourself, that was so badass, everyone was so shocked it was great,” Pidge mused wistfully, remembering finding Aleks sat there surrounded by her tools and a robot in front of her, simply waving at them with one metal hand.  _

 

_ “That was fun, Mochi was a good robot,” Aleks nodded, remembering the way he had reminded her of Coran.  _

 

_ “He was, especially for being built by an eight year old who hadn’t figured out long division yet,” Pidge pointed out. _

 

_ “Hey, long division was hard,” Aleks pouted slightly, looking to Pidge as she laughed, one side of her face lit up by the warm desk light, wild hair tilting forward with her head. She’d missed this, she’d missed Pidge in general, there was always this warmth and light around her that made Aleks feel oddly safe, she has considerably less bad thoughts around her, it was nice, not to mention Pidge was just incredible to talk to about anything. Everything from weird sounding Earth movies to quantum computing and coming up with their own space conspiracy theories. “Hey.” _

 

_ Pidge relaxed and raised an eyebrow at Aleks considerably softened features. “Hm?” _

 

_ “Thanks Pidge, for everything, for teaching me about your weird nerdy shit and converting me to a dork as well. Thanks for listening to me whine and groan like an angsty teen, thanks for our stupid inside jokes that make everyone roll their eyes, thank you for giving me books you think I’d like and already writing little notes for me on the pages, just thank you, for everything you do for me,” Aleks bowed her head, baring herself raw like that made her feel oddly uncomfortable and vulnerable. Pidge leaned back, mouth parted in shock, looking her up and down. “What?” Aleks questioned after a moment too long of silence that’d began to make her doubt her own words. It was something she’d wanted to say for a long time, something she’d wished she’d said before she’d be capture, and something she needed to say now.  _

 

_ “Just… wow,” Pidge mumbles, shaking her head and chuckling. “It’s just, that was the last thing I expected you to say. You’re a lot like Keith is, or was, he’s grown out of it a little bit since we first met, but when he was your age he acted similar to how you are now. Granted you have some of Lance’s ‘charm’ in ya so you’re automatically less hostile, but for the most part, you got Keith’s silent brooding. You just don’t talk about emotions a lot, actually you don’t talk a lot in general, but when you do its like the farthest from your own feelings as possible, which actually, I guess that’s a lot like Lance as well, but I digress. I just am never quite sure what you’re thinking or feeling, you’re expression when you’re just thinking is so… mixed I’m never quite sure how you feel, but hearing you actually say it makes me feel… all gooey inside. Oh no, Aleks you’ve made me a sap, you little shit,” Pidge explained before playfully glaring and pushing the younger girl's shoulder with her foot, making her teeter with a laugh.  _

 

_ “You were always a sap, Pidge, you just are good at hiding it,” Aleks joked, looking at her pointedly. _

 

_ “You know me well,” Pidge nods. “You’re a hell of a lot more observant of emotions than your parents that's for sure.” _

 

_ Aleks shrugged slightly, tugging on her ponytail. “You know before you came around I hated kids, with a firey passion. They were just so loud and snotty, and their hands were always sticky, you never know why either, they’re just always sticky and then try to touch everything. I just didn’t like kids and you came along and I was like great I’m not going to get a break for the next however long I’m stuck on this spaceship. Yet, there you were, this little bundle, you had these big wide grey eyes with the longest eyelashes and you would just stare for hours, I don’t think you cried more than four times when you were a baby, Lance said that’s what he was like as a kid apparently, I call bullshit. But there was this one time where you were just learning what your hands were and you were sitting in my lap and you placed one of your chubby hands on my cheek and just started laughing this bright bubbly giggle and I was instantly wrapped around your little pinky. Then as you got older you only got more and more fascinating, you’ve become a beautiful, intelligent, young woman and I’ve never been more proud to have someone call me family. So thank you, Aleks, for allowing me to learn so much from you, for teaching me patience and that maybe sometimes letting someone work with me is better than working alone. You taught me family and warm love when I was beginning to lose hope in both of those things. But most importantly, thank you for coming home, thank you for coming back to us, I don’t know what I would’ve done if you didn’t.” _

 

_ Aleks blinked in surprise, she most definitely hadn’t been expecting that, because honestly she didn’t expect to mean that much to anyone. Yet, with a shocking realization with Pidge’s words, she took time to consider just how much she mattered. Of course she knew they all cared about her, but honestly, she thought she was just some burden of a kid. Though, thinking about everything they’ve done for her, everything they’ve risked, the memories they all have together, unique and warm, it put things into perspective, feeling an overwhelming rush of love flood over her.  _

 

_ “What’s wrong? Did I say something wrong?” Pidge rushes, worriedly sitting forward. Aleks laughs, shaking her head through tears. _

 

_ “No, no, I’m just so lucky and I just realized it,” Aleks manages out before launching herself into Pidges arms.  _

 

_ Then the memory violently flickers, containing a whole different atmosphere, the castle’s alarm lights an eerily color of purply red, Galra soldiers are everywhere. “Stop! Leave them alone!” Aleks screams, pulling against the Galra arms that are wrapped around her. One particularly large Galra swings a bunch at Lance who tries to struggle out of being tied up like Pidge and Coran already had been, feet and legs tied together behind him, a gag in their mouth and eyes full of fear. Keith is beyond dazed from the amount of beatings he’d taken to avoid being tied up, only ending up with blood streaming down his face. Soon the only person that reminded untied was Shiro, glaring at the Galra around his but, fists clenched.  _

 

_ “The Champion and The Dame, together, my two best creations,” Aleks and Shiro both physically recoil once hearing the voice of their nightmares, her robed body emerging from the shadows and approaching Shiro.  _

 

_ Shiro began to struggle now, the closer she got the more he squirmed in the Galra hold, until there was no longer any distance between them and Haggar was placing one wrinkled finger beneath his chin, forcing him to look her in the eye. A look of fear flashes across his face, murmuring barely heard from Aleks position but Allura begins to thrash about, most likely hearing the exchange. One harsh strike from the Galra besides the princess leaves her face bloody and her movement stilled, Shiro goes to jump in front of the Galra movement but ends up stiff in place, Haggar having raised a hand, smirking.  _

 

_ “C’mon Champion, time to wake up,” Haggar cooed, watching Shiro shake with a mixture of fear and resistance, but no one could hold up that long. Shiro was strong, but his mind was damaged, bits and pieces were missing, he was just mentally more pliable. After a few harsh blinks the shaking stops and a yellow film covers Shiro’s once dark eyes, he moves tentatively at first, flexing his hands before looking up to Haggar with a wicked smile. _

 

_ “Shiro!” Aleks yelps in alarm, watching his tilt his head towards her direction and honestly she doesn't even recognize him anymore, the uncle she once knew and loved seemed to have been erased and replaced by sometimes Haggar frequently showed her in nightmares.  _

 

_ Haggar slowly turned towards her. “Oh don’t worry, it’s your turn now,” Her voice felt like ice through Aleks veins and she wanted to kick and scream but honestly what would that do besides waste her energy? Despite that, it didn’t stop Lance from letting out muffled, indistinguishable shouts from behind his gag, only to be slashed at by the Galra behind him.  _

 

_ “Papa! Stop! You’re only wasting energy and getting hurt,” She quickly yelped over Haggar’s shoulder, making eye contact with the alarmed eyes of both of her fathers. She could tell that the idea almost seemed impossible to do, to watch their daughter be tortured right in front of them, they just couldn’t bare it, yet they knew she was right. _

 

_ “Eyes on me, princess,” Haggar purrs, the nickname sending shivers down Aleks spine. “Don’t you wanna show your family how much of a monster you are? Wouldn’t that be fun, show them how you have killed many of precious monsters, you were incredibly strong and agile for how small and punny you look, girl, but you blood lust, oh your blood lust,” Haggar shakes her head, letting out a pleased hum. “Was unquenchable.” _

 

_ “I just wanted to survive and go back home,” Aleks snarled.  _

 

_ “But thats where you’ve got everything wrong, the Galra Empire is your home, yours and the previous red paladins, your fathers, you’re both one of us,” Haggar growled back. “Plus we know you loved every second you had tearing into everything you could get your little hands on, you loved the feeling of the blood on your hands, you treated it like an art form.” _

 

_ “Shut up!” Aleks screamed. “I’m not falling for this, I hated every minute of it, I hate the Galra, and I hate you. I’d never love taking another life away from someone.” _

 

_ “Hm, very well then,” Haggar took a step backwards and beckoned for Shiro to come forward, glancing at him. “Do your worst.” _

 

_ “As always,” Shiro nodded, a smile evident on his face as he stepped towards Aleks, fear beginning to flow through her veins.  _

 

_ “Shiro, this isn’t you, you need to wake up,” Aleks practically begged.  _

 

_ “But why would I, you and I both know how this feels, it’s intoxicating, you’re stronger when you give in, you’re stronger than anyone in this room, we could be gods among this universe, don’t you want that, kiddo?” Aleks nearly vomits hearing the way the usually warm nickname sounds rolling off his tongue now, yellow eyes making her skin tingle.  _

 

_ “No, I don’t want that! You don’t want that!” She yelled back. _

 

_ “Oh but I do, I want it so badly, you don’t know how many times I’ve wanted to snap your pretty little neck,” Shiro said smoothly, running a finger crossed her throat. “I know you feel it to, you want to kill them all sometimes, sometime you just want to stab them in the stomach with a fork to see their face when you do, the hurt the betrayal, you just want to ‘accidently’ push them into a gladiator’s blade to see the life fade from their eyes.” _

 

_ Everything in Aleks chest clenched with pleasure at the mere idea of the words he was suggesting, the deep dark part of her brain, the part she didn’t listen to and didn’t like, the broken part, purred with glee. Yes yes she had moments staring at Allura working on something when her black rotten brain would sneak in and suggest just how easy it would be to slit her throat right there, the gasp, the blood, but it’d make her sick to her stomach, because she didn’t want that, the part of her that wasn’t her wanted that, but not her.  _

 

_ “I-I, no!” Aleks squawked making Shiro smile.  _

 

_ “Hesitation is no good, Aleks,” He tsked, turning to grab something, nodding at the Galra holding her, making Aleks’ eyes widen when she felt the constricting arms release her. She was free. “Try to run and I’ll kill you myself.” _

 

_ She swallowed roughly, blinking when Shiro pushed a gun into her palm. “What…” _

 

_ “Shoot one of them, kill one of them, your pick,” Shiro nodded towards the widened eyes of the rest of their team staring back at them. “You know you want to, just do it, kiddo.” _

 

_ Aleks looked between the shocked and fearful faces of her family and then to Shiro, a small smirk on his lips and those goddamn yellow eyes. She put on a smirk, nodding, and flashing yellowed eyes. “You’re right, I do.” _

 

_ Keith and Pidge were yelling through their gags now, squirming in their restraints as Aleks turned to the line of them, gun pointed and swinging back and forth as if to choose a target. Lance sat in shock, staring at his daughter and her yellow Galra eyes and wondering if he was going to die, would his own daughter kill him? Aleks glanced back at Shiro with a smile, “I never miss.” _

 

_ Shiro nods proudly before his eyes widen, the gunshot ringing throughout the room. Everyone is frozen, Aleks stood, eyes wide and her normal grey clouded with tears, hands shaking. Shiro blinked, eyes flickering between yellow and brown, looking down to the bullet wound in his stomach, looking back up to Aleks, shaking her head, “I’m sorry, Shiro, I’m so sorry, I had to.” _

 

_ Shiro’s mouth opened and closed, hand pressing to the bleeding before he stumbled backwards and toppled over, a choked sob pushing it’s way out of her lips before promptly turning to the Galra and Haggar staring back in anger and closely approaching. “I’m going to fucking kill you all,” Aleks growled, giving them the same flash of yellow and fangs before diving. The guards behind her family were the first to go, three heads shots and one slightly off and hitting him in the neck instead, purple blood splattering. Ducking under a swing from one of the guards coming for her and swiftly shooting him in the chest. The memory seemed to continue like that for five minutes, full of growls and purple blood and the occasional hiss when Aleks was just slightly too slow, until Aleks was left standing between limb Galra bodies, chest heaving, a mixture of purple and crimson flowing down her face and arms.  _

 

_ “Well done, Dame,” Haggar’s voice rings out making her whip around to see the druid standing behind her scared family. She could feel her once adrenaline and anger induced blood lust drain from her along with the yellowed eyes and Galra traits she’d inherited, glancing around and seeing the scattered bodies, Shiro among them, fingers twitching ever so slightly.  _

 

_ Aleks shakily raised her gun wielding hand, pointing it at the wrinkled women who only smirked in return as an overwhelming wave of deja vu came over her. They’d done this before. The memory rushed forward, she remembers the druid’s life fade away when she’d sunk the blade deep in her chest, falling limp as she ran to escape. “You’re not real.” _

 

_ Haggar’s smile falters slightly as Aleks begins to walk closer to the rest of the apaladins, still tied up and watching them interact in alarm. “What are you-” _

 

_ “I killed you, you’re not real,” Aleks says, hard and certain before running a hand completely through the women, making her flicker before becoming whole again. Aleks lets out a stiff laugh. “Clever trick, druid.” _

 

_ Then she’s ducking down to free her family with shaky, blood covered hands, gags first and then the ties on their feet. Haggar lets out a growl before seemingly flickering away.  _

 

_ “Get off of me,” Allura shouts once Aleks had untied her restraints, making the younger girl jump back from the ferocity of her glare before the princess ran towards Shiro’s body. “Shiro! Shiro! Wake up, I can’t loose you too! Wake up!” _

 

_ Aleks watched wide eyed as Allura’s head whips to Aleks, her face scrunched into something so menacing, something that had never been on Allura’s face before. “What did you do? Why did you shoot him? You’re a monster.” _

 

_ Aleks flinches back, hands beginning to shake even more, “I-I-” _

 

_ “Aleks,” It’s weak and she almost doesn’t hear it but judging by the way Allura head shoots to look down at Shiro, she inches closer until he’s slowly blinking up at her with familiar brown eyes. “Thank you, it was the only way, thank you. I didn’t mean anything I said, I love you, kiddo.” _

 

_ Aleks lets out a choked sob looking at Shiro’s pale smiling face. She’d killed him, he was dying and it was her fault. “Allura get him to a healing pod,” She quickly said, trying to keep her voice level. _

 

_ “Aleks-” Allura begins, eyes soft and apologetic. _

 

_ “Hurry, Galra are probably coming, Hunk and Pidge you should cover them,” Aleks bites her lip, turning to the rest of the paladins looking down at her. Allura quickly picks up Shiro with ease and beacons for them to follow as she begins to jog down to the hall as quiet as they can. Within’ seconds of their departure she feels arms wrap around her body, taking in a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding she smells the familiar scent of her father. _

 

_ “Aleks,” He whispers, brushing his hand through her hair, reminding her of all of the numerous times he’d done the same thing when she was younger and scared of the war they were in or just simply the dark. She wishes it was just the dark this time. She can feel her guard fall when Keith also wraps his arms around her, a small gasped sob shaking her frame, blood smearing on her fathers’ paladin suits. “It’s okay it’ll be okay.” _

 

_ Aleks shakily nods, looking up to Lance with teary eyes, who smiles back, feeling stupid for ever thinking the girl in front of him, his daughter, the perfect blend of him and the person he loves, could ever do anything to harm him, no matter what she was put through, she was the strongest person he knew. “Mi hija te amo,” Lance manages to say, only at the end of his words his breath gets caught in his throat, eyes wide. Keith jumps back in alarm at the shot that rings out, watching the crimson begin to blossom across the blue eyed boys armor. There in the entrance stood a whole new fleet of Galra, guns drawn and ready to kill, the hologram of Haggar smiling at them as Lance wobbled.  _

 

_ “Papa!” Aleks screamed, barely managing to catch him as his knees buckled. Keith watched in horror, his husband falling onto his daughter, soaking them in his blood, his own grey eyes staring up to him in fear, begging him to move, to do something. They were going to die, they were going to die here, Lance was dying right here. With glossy eyes, Keith glares at the line of readied soldiers, feeling his skin began to itch, eyes twitching and growing. Aleks watched in awe as her father’s once human skin became purple in patches before covering his whole body, eyes elongating, and eyes glossing over yellow. Keith bares his fangs at the Galra before him before diving right in.  _

_ “Papa! Stay awake, you have to stay awake!” Aleks sobbed, pressing her hands to his cheeks, still warm, relishing in that, because who knew how long until he began to loose that all. Lance blinked back at her, eyes owlish and murky.  _

 

_ “Where is Keith? Where is your dad?” He manages to croak out, eyes frantically darting about to find him, finally spotting the purpled man sending his blade through a Galra before flipping to kick another in the head with a roundhouse, elegantly slitting their neck while doing so.  _

 

_ “He’ll be here soon, you’ve gotta stay awake until then,” Aleks begged, tears hanging on her thick eyelashes. “Promise?” _

 

_ Lance opens and closes his mouth slightly, could he keep that promise? His hands were going numb and his side burned. He wanted to promise that, he’d try to keep his promise, for her, for Keith, for his family back on Earth who most likely had long forgotten him. “I-I promise.” _

 

_ Aleks nods furiously, like those two words single-handedly meant the world to her, and honestly they did. She couldn’t handle if he was to die, she wouldn’t be able to bare it.  _

 

_ A clatter is heard behind them, making them direct their attention to the see Keith drop the last Galra to the ground, making Haggar snarl and hiss in anger, flickering in and out before disappear completely once more, most likely to get another band of purple monkeys. They probably wouldn’t survive that one.  _

 

_ Keith rushes to their side, purple skin slipping away like it had came, the yellow film fading away to reveal grey worried eyes, kneeling to Lance. “Lance, baby, keep your eyes open, keep them open, look at me.” _

 

_ Lance’s eyes lazily look to Keith before a small twitch of a smile stretches his lips. “Hey you’re hot, you don’t happen to have a husband or anything right? I’d really like to take you out on a date.” _

 

_ Keith lets out a broken laugh, tears falling from his eyes as he shakes his head. “I’ve got this really annoying husband, unfortunately, but he doesn’t have to know.” _

 

_ Lance raises a shaky hand, tears tainting his own eyes, placing it onto Keith’s neck to pull him down to his own cracked lips, sharing a passionate kiss, one that would most likely be their last. “I’ll pick you up tomorrow at eight?” _

 

_ Keith nods furiously. “C-Can’t wait.” _

 

_ Lance smiles, nodding slowly. “You need to get Aleks into a pod, send her on the safest route, it will know where to take her, they’re here for her, if she stays here then-” _

 

_ He cuts himself off, not wanting to say the word, doesn’t want to think of his daughter in that situation, in his situation. Aleks’ eyes widen, looking between them, “What? No! I’m not leaving you! I’m not!” _

 

_ “I love you, Aleks, I love you so much, never forget that okay?” Lance mumbles, eyes spilling with tears, mixing with blood and sweat, bringing her close to press a kiss to her forehead. Aleks lets out a cry of protest as Keith lifts her away from him, kicking and grabbing for the blue paladin, who only smiles sadly back at her.  _

 

_ The sound of footsteps in the hallways makes Keith quicken his pace, despite Aleks screams and sobs, each one breaking Keith’s heart, but none the less he manages to push her into an escape pod. She tries to fight her way out of his, pushing her hands against his chest, hitting him, screaming. “I love you, Aleks, I don’t know where this pod is going, but we’ll find you. I promise.” _

 

_ The glass slides over the pod, successfully locking Aleks in, her eyes widening in alarm before her fists pound against it. Keith quickly types in the instructions for the pod, smiling sadly at his daughter, hot, fat tears rolling down his bloodied cheeks before she’s launched out and the castle is all she can see, surrounded by Galra ships, all of which seem to see her, the small speck zooming out of the castle, but she doesn't care, she doesn’t even care when they start to pummel her ship, she just keeps screaming, keeps crying. _

 

And that’s how she wakes up, bolting upright in a scream, tears rolling down her cheeks. She stares around the room in alarm, not quite remembering that those had only been memories, that she was still stuck in the past, and everyone who she’d just witnessed probably die, stare back at her with younger, shocked faces. She ducks her head into her hands, pulling at the brown locks when she makes slightly eye contact with Shiro, who looks absolutely mortified. She remembers it all now and she wishes she didn’t, she remembers the shaking of her hands when she’d pulled the trigger, the blood, the look of shock on Shiro’s face, Allura calling her a monster, she remembered it all. And she was, she was a monster. She’d killed them all, she wishes that she’d never escaped, that she’d stayed trapped on the Galra ship in the first place until she rotted or gotten picked off by one of Haggar’s monsters. 

 

“Aleks,” The voice was soft and hesitate, a few padded footsteps come towards her, making her flinch away, looking up with a snarl, baring fangs and yellow eyes making everyone jump back in surprise. 

 

“Don’t touch me, don’t,” She growled, tears still running from the eery Galra eyes. She shakes her head repeatedly, until the yellow flickers and fades and soft sobs hiccup from her lips. “Don’t touch me, I’ll only hurt you, I-I kill everything I touch.”

  
Sorrow and pain fills the room. Everyone is full of regret, hurt, and shock. They regret making her go through that, they hurt for Aleks and for the memories they’d saw, and they were shocked by all of the information they received just from Aleks’ memories alone. But none of that mattered when Aleks was crumbled in a broken mess, wires still stuck to her sweaty head. “They’re all dead, my whole family, they’re all dead, I don’t have a home to go back to,” She manages to choke out, looking up at the beginnings of her future and aching. They ache in return. One universal thought was shared; Fuck the Galra. 


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know it's been just about fucking forever but here's a small update. it's sad but srsly what is new.

 

_ “ _ Dude, she’s looks the perfect cross between harmless and badass. Like she’ll laugh while she kicks your ass,” Hunk waved wildly, making Keith and Lance both raise an eyebrow at his conclusion on Aleks. 

 

“Gotta agree with you on that one Hunk,” Pidge nodded. “The girl is fucking wild.”

 

“Language Pidge,” Shiro scolded, earning an eyeroll from the younger.

 

“She’s fracking wild,” Pidge teases, before opening the door to the training deck, stopping mid-step when Aleks comes into view fighting the bots. 

 

She pants, wiping away the sweat from her forehead before nimbly ducking out of one of the bots limbs that come sweeping toward her, swinging her legs in a circle around her body, successfully managing to knock three of the five bots surrounding her to the floor. Bouncing back up, she lands a sharp jab to one of the remaining three bot’s temple, sending it down like a ragdoll. She moves quickly but she lets out a small gasp at seeing one of the bot’s fists dangerously close to her face, leaning away into a backbend, flipping her legs above her in a handstand and latching her feet to one of the bots necks and jerking forward, sending one bot flying into the other and propelling herself into a roll. Her chest heaves looking around her cautiously to make sure all of the bots were down before standing and turning around, pausing when she saw the rest of the team of Voltron standing in the doorway, eyes full of awe and twinge of fear. 

 

“Oh,” Aleks mumbles between breaths. “Hey.”

 

“What level was that?” Allura questions, walking forward. 

 

“Uh, level twenty-four I think,” Aleks shrugged, grabbing for one of the water bottle near the wall.

 

“Twenty-four?! I haven’t even gotten past five yet!” Lance gawks. 

 

“C’est la vie,” Aleks smirked over her shoulder.

“Say la what?” Coran questions in confusion. 

 

“It means that’s life in French, it’s one of the languages on Earth,” Pidge explains, seeming to almost make Coran more puzzled. 

 

“You have more than one language? That just seems counter productive, how are you supposed to communicate if you don’t speak the same language?” Coran scrunched his eyebrows together. 

 

“Well, you kind of don’t, unless you learn it or something, I mean some of us speak different language but we still have one common language, so we’re able to communicate,” Hunk steps into the conversation as well.

 

“Yeah! Like I speak Spanish too! It was my first language,” Lance speaks up, sending Coran a prideful smile. 

 

“And I speak a little bit of Korean, Shiro too,” Keith adds with a nod.

 

“I speak a little Hawaiian, but only a little bit,” Hunk chuckled out, rubbing his neck. 

 

“And I’m trilingual!” Aleks spins towards Coran with a smile, hair twirling around her in a circle, making Coran raise his eyebrows in surprise. “Spanish, Korean, and English… actually I’m quadrilingual if you count Galran I guess, but I think languages are really cool and unique! It’s just about the community of it ya know, every language is usually paired with different cultures and ethnicities, but all in all, we all still are humans who can enjoy the same art, or literature, or hobbies,” She shrugs a little, realizing how much she’d babbled, but still giving him a smile that looked eerily similar to Lance’s. “I just think that’s really cool.”

 

Coran hums for a moment before nodding. “That, although peculiar, is quite… awesome.”

 

Aleks nods eagerly, glad she hadn’t come off too over-bearing, she just found Earth culture so interesting. Pidge watched curiously, this was the first time Aleks seemed to show an outward interest in anything, she was usually stoic, much like Keith, but in this moment she couldn’t help see the resemblances between her and Lance. Shiro meanwhile was still caught up on the younger girls fighting tactics, her fluid and precise movements, the way her grey eyes darted back and forth between robots, seemingly coming up with a plan and its multiple ways of succeeding or backfiring in moments. It was extremely impressive and intrigued him. 

 

“Hey Aleks,” Shiro speaks up, making Aleks jump, smile faltering and disappearing into the corner of her mouth, swiveling on the balls of her feet to meet his gaze. “Wanna spar with me?”

 

“Oh,” Aleks mumbles, nervously beginning to drum her fingers against the side of her thigh, eyes drifting around the room in thought.

 

“Are you sure that’s a good idea, Shiro?” Lance questions, raising a suspicious eyebrow at the older man. 

 

“No, uh, it’s okay, I’m a little rusty anyways, fighting with bots isn’t the same as fighting with a real thinking being,” Aleks shrugs, but the thumps of tapping continue to duly sound from her fingers. “Game on, Shiro.”

 

Shiro nods, walking to the training deck, Aleks following close behind, both finding their footing, standing opposite of one another. Shiro quickly flicks out his right arm by his side, the purple glow beginning to emanate from the prosthetic, making Aleks raise an eyebrow. “Oh, so we can use our Galra goodies in this? I usually don’t when training, but it’ll make for an interesting fight,” Aleks hummed, smirking slightly. She too stretches both of her arms out at her sides, but unlike Shiro, there isn’t a prosthetic there to give the Galra glow, instead the eery purple seems to radiate from her skin, covering both of her arms from finger to shoulder. Lifting one finger, she manifests a violet orb right on the tip of her pointer finger and begins to twirl it in between her fingers with a smile, eyes flickering yellow and pointed canines pressing over her bottom lip. Shiro almost wants to back out then, seeing the girl this lethal up close was… kind of unnerving. She was powerful, more powerful than anything he’d probably experienced, even with all of Haggar’s monsters in the arena, but this was Haggar’s masterpiece, in her own words. “Bring it,” She grits out with one last smile before diving with speed Shiro could barely keep his eyes on, letting out a grunt when a heated punch lands right below his ribs, managing to knock the breath out of him. 

 

She bounces away from him quickly before he can recover and send an equally as force full hit to her, swaying from foot to first, her eyes seems to take account for every part of his body, every shift in his stance and glance of his eyes, she catches it. The purple orb manifests in her palm once more before she sends in his way with a flick, making Shiro duck away in surprise, feeling the heat of the orb brush his cheek. “Nice one,” She nods. 

 

Shiro tries to go in for a swift kick to her legs to send her toppling over, but it’s futile as the moment his right leg twitches she’s already in the air, jumping over his leg, and instead through him off by extending her own leg, but he’s quick as well, managing to snatch her ankle mid air before it hit him. She lets out a small gasp when he begins to pull her, bu moves quickly to swing her right leg over his broad shoulders, sitting upon them, much to Shiro’s surprise. There is a moment of calm in the storm where Aleks leans over his head with a smile, “Boop!” She presses the pad of her pointer finger on his sharp nose, starling him. Long strands of brown falling around his head as she tilts her own with a larger grin before sitting up straight once more, tightening her legs around his throat and propelling her own body backwards, sending this both to the training deck floor with a umph. 

Aleks sits up quickly with a grin, stray bits of hair hanging in her face as she looked over the pained face of Shiro. “That was fun! You fight a lot different than you do when you’re older, it’s interesting seeing you make such reckless uncalculated moves.”

 

The rest of team Voltron gawk at her blunt statement to their strongest member, so simply putting down his fighting skills when he was the best out of all of them. They could barely touch how well he fought, and here she was, having taken him down in less than three minutes and then belittling his technique. She lifts herself up, eyes back to the dark stormy color and purple glow nowhere to be seen, holding the slender, scarred hand out to Shiro. Shiro glances from her hand to her, heavy breaths still sliding through parted lips before grabbing it and being heaved back into a standing position. “I will say though you’re really good at dodges and counterattacks,” Aleks nods, clapping a hand onto his shoulder before spinning to the others watching the scene. “That reminds me! Wanna see something cool?”

 

Everyone looks to each other to find some sort of solid answer, because Aleks’ idea of fun could be extremely warped from their idea of fun. She sighs and waves a hand over to their bayards hanging on the wall. “Watch,” She says before picking up Keith’s bayard, taking a few tentative steps away from them. Nothing happens for a moment, making her rolls her eyes before shaking the bayard. Within moments from the shake the bayard transforms into a large double-ended sword, a large smile stretching across her face as she expertly twirls it with both hands. “Even if I’m not your red paladin in this time, I still have half of your DNA, so the lions recognize that, they also recognize that there is another change though and flex the shape of the bayard to fit the difference. So if any of your DNA changed drastically, so would your bayard form,” She informs all while still turning the sword. “This works the same with Lance’s bayard, here look.”

 

She jerks the red bayard once more, reverting it back to its original form before grabbing the blue bayard. It doesn’t even need a jerk or command before changing into a more slender looking rifle. She looks up to them with a devious smirk. “It’s a flame thrower.”

 

“No way!” Lance gasps in amazement, circling Aleks in awe. “That’s fucking awesome!”

 

“Right!” Aleks quickly agrees, before flicking the bayard back into its original form and setting it back on it’s rack.

 

“Alright, as impressive and interesting as that was, we need to start training,” Shiro announces making everyone groan. “Aleks you’re welcome to watch if you’d like.”

 

“Oh, right,” Aleks hums, pulling her hair back in thought. “I think I’m going to go work on something I’ve been trying to figure out, but I hope you guys have a good training!” 

 

Everyone watches as the younger girl gives them a quick wave before disappearing from their sight. 

 

“I may be biased,” Lance begins. “But she’s badass.”

 

\---------------------

Training that day seemed to last forever, finally ending near dinner time, after Allura finally noticed their fatigue in response to her incessant drilling. 

 

“God, that bot really got my hard in the ribs,” Hunk groaned, kneading the heel of his palm into his side, face scrunched with pain. 

 

“You were focusing too much on one bot at a time, you must take all of your surroundings into sight,” Allura responded. 

 

“How am I supposed to do that when I’m already trying to take down another bot,” Hunk squawked in frustration.

 

“Do you think the Galra will wait for you to fight one of them at a time?” Allura eyed Hunk, making him close his mouth and groan. “That’s what I thought.”

 

“I’m starving,” Lance groaned.

 

“Agreed, even food goo sounds good right now,” Hunk nods eagerly at the prospect of food. “Coran are you going to-”

 

Hunk is abruptly cut off by a harsh shush and a finger to his lip, making his eyes go wide and eyeing Lance who peaked around the corner of the kitchen doorway. He smirks and waves everyone to come closer, each of them trying to fit themselves into the doorway.

 

“Mamma Mia! Here we I again, my my, how could I resist you?” Aleks sang, a spoon clenched in one fist and held up to her mouth as she bobbed her head and twisted about. “Mamma Mia! Does it show again, my my,  j ust how much I've missed you?”

 

As she finishes singing the words she spins on her socked feet, how she had managed to find socks that fit her around the castle without snooping into other people's rooms was questionable. Actually, thinking about it, Pidge did recognize those socks. She pretends to do an air guitar, letting her hair swing in front of her face, continuing to sing the song slightly off key. 

 

“Yes! I’ve been broken hearted, blue since the-” Aleks spins around once more, only to choke on her words when her eyes meet six amused eyes staring back at her. She lets out a startled squeal before going a shade of beat red. “I was just- uh- I’m-”

 

“How do you even know that song? You haven’t been back to Earth right?” Lance speaks up, finally standing and entering the kitchen, a smile lingering on his face. Aleks’ face is still on fire, she’s sure that she could compete with Red’s fire powers right about now.

 

Pouting, she answers. “No, I’ve never been, but uh… you used to sing it when I was younger, we’d… as a family, cook breakfast in the morning and we’d all sort of sing it and dance and stuff. Uh, yeah,” She quickly turns away from the lot of them, lip snagged between her teeth, working hard on whatever it was she was preparing. 

 

Lance frowns, looking at the rest of his team for any clue on what to do. This girl had somehow appeared here, in a completely different time, and will remain here for god knows how long, after just remembering the fact her family could be dead and that she may have no where to even return to. They hadn’t even really talked about it all. Aleks reclused to her room soon after the whole ordeal and didn’t emerge until the next morning, where she pretended everything was fine and nothing had happened the night before. They hadn’t even gotten the chance to talk about the fact that Keith was Galra, which who knows how he was handling that new information. Everything was fucked up and overwhelming quite frankly. 

 

“Aleks…” Lance started tentatively. Aleks tenses at the sound of her own name but makes no move to respond or turn to Lance. “Are you okay?”

 

“I’m fine,” She simply replies, going back to stirring whatever mixture she was concocting. 

 

“It’s okay to admit you’re not okay, I know this situation is kind of weird, but you just found out that your family might be-” Lance starts to speak again, only to be cut off by Aleks whirrling around, fists clenched at her sides and eyes glaring daggers at him. 

 

“I said I’m fucking fine, can’t you just leave me alone! Tu esta no mi papa! Tu eres no mi familia!” Aleks spits back at him with a fury that only Keith had ever sent towards him. Lance flinches back at the words. 

 

“I-I’m not trying to replace him or them, we just want to help,” Lance tries once more. 

 

“I don’t need your help. I’m fine on my own,” Aleks growls back at him. It was very obvious to all of them that she was not fine, on her own or not. She was in no way okay. Keith knew best though, this was exactly how his outbursts would usually go, it was kind of odd to see someone else do almost the exact same thing that he used to do when he was younger, or still sort of does quite honestly. Bad habits die hard. Being alone and without a family for your whole life dies harder. 

 

Keith places a gentle hand of Lance’s arm as he begins to open his mouth one more time, shaking his head. “Give her some space, go do something else, pushing her isn’t going to help anything,” He explains. Lance, though, doesn’t look too happy about it. Surely, he’d been raised a much different way, space wasn’t a concept he was familiar with, there was never space in his house unless you ran away, but even then you’d always end up coming back. There was something comfortable to him about the lack of space, sometimes you needed the annoying push you just aren’t looking for at the moment to actually help you, from his experience. Finally, with a sigh, he nods, looking to the rest of the tense group still near the door nodding his head at them and they all began to file out of the kitchen. Keith, though, lingered, taking a seat at the breakfast bar, watching Aleks’ back until everyone was out of hearing distance. 

 

“I’m not going to talk to you if that’s why you’re here,” Aleks mumbles, the vigor from before drained out of her voice, leaving only traces of it behind. 

 

“I’m not going to make you talk. I’m just going to be here,” Keith shrugs. So, they stay like that for a while, the silence hanging over them, both staying in their positions like statues. 

 

“Ya know, when I first lost my dad I really didn’t know what to do, I was all sorts of lost, and I was really young. He was all the family I had left and then one day he was just gone and I didn’t know if he was dead or just left me or not, I still don’t. For a while, I just tried to pretend like everything was alright, because in my mind, it kind of was. I didn’t need anyone else to help me anymore, I could do everything just fine on my own. And it worked for a while, I’d take myself to the bus stop for school every morning, work on school work, all that jazz, and it was truly okay. But then, after two weeks, the house was really dark and quiet at night and then the power went off, as well as the water, and then I ran out of food, and I didn’t know what to do. I started to starve, but I was still convinced that everything was okay, that I had it all under control,” Keith explains, Aleks still unmoving, but listening. “I was only about eight at the time and it didn’t take long for my teacher to notice something was up and to try and call my parents, but after numerous failed attempts she just asked me. At first I was so angry, so angry she’d even suggest something was wrong with me to begin with. I just yelled and screamed and threw things, I broke a lot of things in that classroom that day. And then she just asked if I was all alone and for the first time I realized I was, even if I had myself, I was still alone. I just broke down, because being alone is one of the worst, most painful and dark places that exists.

 

Keith pauses for a moment, fiddling with a piece of dead skin near his nail. “My point is, you don’t have to be alone. I was alone for so long, after my dad left, after getting kicked from the Garrison, and it was horrible. I didn’t realize how nice it was to have… a family. Since I’ve been on this ship with all of these people who I once probably would’ve considered strangers, I’ve learned how incredible it feels to not be alone anymore. Even if what family you did have is not here right now and you don’t want to believe in any other family or love like that, you still have us here to help if you need it. You’re not alone, Aleks.”

 

A moment of silence passes after Keith finally stops talking, and his mouth feels dry and nervous. He usually would never ever divulge that much information about himself to anyone ever, especially not such personal information. But Aleks reminded him so much of himself, that he was almost sure that their feelings mirrored each other's in some aspect. He said what he wished he would’ve heard when he was younger, that it was okay to ask for help and to want to not be alone. It was okay to be lonely and not want to be anymore. 

 

A soft noise echos throughout the kitchen, barely noticeable at first before picking up in volume. That’s when Keith realized Aleks was crying, hand pulled up to her mouth to stifle the sobs slightly, but the tears flowed hot and fat down her cheeks. He’s moving before he has the chance to think, turning her around to face him, taking one look at the eyes that matched his own, watery and so heartbroken, before pulling her into his chest. 

 

She doesn’t hold back after that, hiccuping, shoulders heaving up and down, gasping for air in between the forceful sobs. “T-They’re gone, they’re dead, I lost them,” She mumbles into his chest. “I-I killed Shiro!”

 

“Oh no no no,” Keith hummed, pulled her away from him and frowning down at her pained face. “You didn’t kill him, you were doing what you had to. You heard what Shiro said, it’s not your fault. You didn’t kill Shiro.”

 

Aleks lets out more choked sobs, trying frantically to wipe away the tears that continue to pool and slide down her face. “I’m a monster. If I wasn’t such a crazy fucked up mess they’d all be okay and alive and I’d still be there.”

 

“You need to stop blaming yourself. You couldn’t have stopped any of this from happening. Did you want to be kidnapped by the Galra?” Keith raises an eyebrow, she shakes her head quickly. “Then, in no way is this your fault.”

 

“It still hurts so much,” She cried, gripping his, now soaked, shirt. 

 

Keith frowned because this wasn’t something he could help with logic or reason, this was just emotion, something he wasn’t that good at himself. “I know, I’m sorry.”

 

“It’s not your fault,” She mumbles, her sobs beginning to slightly calm down, but her shaky, stuttering breaths remain. 

 

“Still… I know that feeling. No one deserves to feel like that, especially not you. After everything you’ve gone through with the Galra and now… now this, I can’t imagine how you’re feeling right now. You deserve a break and as much as I wish I could say your time here would be one, it’s probably going to be hell. Wondering whether or not your family is alive or not or if you’re going to be able to get back… it must be terrifying. I’m sorry,” Keith replies, sighing out a deep breath, even imagining the feelings she must be having right now weighed heavy on his own chest. 

 

She shrugs, wiping away the tears that’d finally stopped leaking down her cheeks, leaving swollen eyes and blotchy red cheeks behind. This close to her, Keith could see freckles. Freckles… he definitely didn’t have freckles, that meant that Lance had freckles he hadn’t noticed before. Or maybe it was recessive gene. He put it on his to-do list to check. “It sucks, yeah. I mean it really really fucking sucks, but… everyone on this ship is going through the same thing more or less. Minus the Galra kidnapping shit… besides Shiro. Everyone on this ship is wondering whether they’ll make it back to their families alive again. You guys are all just kids still, and now you’re in the middle of a war you didn’t even knew existed before. They didn’t even get the chance to say goodbye, at least I have that. People like… like Lance. I can’t imagine that burden. The weight of carrying that many people you care about, that all probably think you’re dead, that miss you so much. That you miss back, so so much and then there is the fear of not only yourself dying, but them because of this war you’re in. You never know if the Galra may attack Earth just like they did Altea. You never know if you may see the place you grew up, the people you left behind. Sure, everyone here has a family. Hunk has his moms and a little sister he left behind. Shiro has his mom. Pidge still has her mom back on Earth too. But Lance…,” Aleks shakes her head, sending messy brown strands stumbling down to hang off the bridge of her nose. “That must hurt so much.”

 

Keith isn’t really sure what to do after she stops talking. There isn’t much he can do but stand and take in the information she just threw at him. Sure he’d been aware that for everyone on this ship, leaving Earth was extremely hard, so was the homesickness. Keith, even though he didn’t have anyone waiting or wondering where he was, he still missed his little shack sometimes. But to leave behind family, without saying goodbye, and being ejected into a war, where your fates hang by a single thread, the anxiety of that was almost too much to imagine. Keith knew Lance had come from a large family, and before this he’d really only accounted that for his loud personality and his talent for getting in absolutely everyone's space. But now, he sees that it’s much more than that. It’s the way he asks and makes sure everyone is absolutely 100% okay after every battle, once even forcing Pidge into a cryopod for a small bump to the head. It was the way he could go from the loudest person in the room, trying to get everyone's attention, to simply observing, quiet and analytical. It’s the way he’d find Lance sometimes staring at Earth on the star projector, or curled up to Hunk, both of them sleeping, in the living room. Lance, he was beginning to notice, was much more than he’d originally pegged him. Sure he’s loud, competitive, obnoxious, and gets on his very very last nerve sometimes. But he’s also caring, so so so caring, logical and analytical, saving his ass numerous times with that fact. And he was a self-sacrificing idiot because of his huge heart, as soon as you met Lance and suddenly meant something to him, anything at all, or meant something to someone he cared about, he’d instantly risk his life for you, put it all on the line for your sake. This has landed him in a pod more than enough times and withered Hunk down into a worrying mess. 

 

“Yeah… it must,” Keith whispers between them. Neither are aware of the ears listening in on them, cobalt eyes peering around the corner of the kitchen door. Gone as quickly as they appeared. 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry for being away for so long, I kinda lost interest in this story, but I was having writers block with my current story and decided to reread this one and realized I missed aleks (': so heres an update for ya... its not edited like always but. bleh take it .

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you guys liked it!
> 
> You can contact me on twitter  
> @fairyuphoria


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